New York, NY, February 12, 2013 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) is outraged and appalled that a group of participants in the UNESCO-affiliated Aalst Carnaval dressed as Nazi SS officers and paraded through the streets of Aalst, Belgium on a rail car reminiscent of those used to deport Jews to concentration camps during the Holocaust.

Photos in the Belgian media showed the men dressed in full Nazi regalia with a Hasidic Jewish boy character on a railcar, decorated with posters depicting pails labeled, “Zyklon,” the chemical used in the Nazi gas chambers.

On February 11, ADL wrote to Irina Bokova, Director General of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization bringing this outrageous display to her attention. “We know you agree that UNESCO should never allow itself to be associated with such expressions,” the League wrote. “We ask that you publicly disassociate UNESCO from this repugnant incident, and declare that any similar act in the future would put the Aalst Carnaval’s status on the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage at risk.”

“We are outraged and appalled that the Aalst Carnaval included such a horrific display trivializing and mocking the Holocaust,” said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director and a Holocaust survivor. “Public acts of this kind have no place in any society and it is that much more incomprehensible that this could happen in an event affiliated with the United Nations. We are glad that UNESCO spoke out.”

The League welcomed remarks from UNESCO’s Director General, Ms. Bokova, who made clear that the public acts were a “violation of the spirit of the Aalst Carnival, characterized by freedom and satire, which cannot justify the recourse to anti-Semitic stereotypes,” and referred to the trivialization of the Holocaust to fuel hatred “in the very heart of the continent where this tragedy occurred.”

Under the German occupation, the Germany military police carried out deportations of nearly 25,000 Jews from Belgium to the Auschwitz extermination camp, where most were murdered, according to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Fewer than 2,000 of the deportees survived.

ADL is the world’s leading anti-hate organization. Founded in 1913 in response to an escalating climate of anti-Semitism and bigotry, its timeless mission is to protect the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment for all. Today, ADL continues to fight all forms of hate with the same vigor and passion. A global leader in exposing extremism, delivering anti-bias education, and fighting hate online, ADL is the first call when acts of anti-Semitism occur. ADL’s ultimate goal is a world in which no group or individual suffers from bias, discrimination or hate.